Staten Island mural proclaims danger of prescription drug abuse

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -The message from nine local artists is loud and clear on the powerful mural now completed on the large brick wall at 821 Castleton Ave. in West Brighton: PILLZ KILLZ.

Translation: Abuse of prescription drugs has claimed far too many young lives on Staten Island, and much more must be done to combat the deadly epidemic.

"This was an opportunity to bring a very edgy message to the community," said Great Kills resident Charlie Balducci of NYC Arts Cypher, who helped spearhead the project. "This issue is so important -- people are dying."

The wall also demonstrates that graffiti artists can contribute "something positive," he said.

Enthusiasm was high at the ribbon-cutting ceremony on Thursday, as the artists posed for photographs and video, and discussed their work on the 60-by-25-foot wall.

"We did it collectively, and we worked together as a team," said Rosebank street artist Kwue Molly, who was born and reared in Port Richmond. "The government has to do more to regulate the doctors who are prescribing pills," he said, pointing out his greedy-looking Uncle Sam caricature and the Federal Drug Administration renamed "Feeding Deadly Addictions."

"I believe that this epidemic has affected everyone on the Island," said Chris Malfi, 25, a West Brighton artist. "Addiction is called the blues because it weighs people down," Malfi commented, pointing out the depressed-looking man in a suit, caged behind a permanent fence and tied to a ball and chain, one of the images that his collective, Artoffpaper -- with Brendan Munday and Jared Long -- painted on the wall.

"Drugs are celebrated in all forms of entertainment," Malfi added. "But you become a zombie -- it dulls your senses."

Malfi pointed to the images of people trapped inside prescription-drug bottles to illustrate his point. "We wanted to be part of this wall. Hopefully, we will change a few lives with this imagery," he said.

CRYING ELEPHANT

Magie Serpico, who lives in South Beach and works as an artist at Bullseye Tattoos on New Dorp Lane, has a thing about elephants.

So her contribution to the wall -- a purple elephant, shedding blood-red tears, surrounded by floating pills disguised as pretty butterflies, birds, and angels -- rings with particular poignancy.

Her intent was to produce images "childlike and colorful, but also corrupted, with graphic, disturbing content," she said on Friday, pointing out the ominous black clouds painted in the background. "And then there's the double play about an elephant in the room," she added.

GET KIDS TO THE WALL

"The art is intended to provoke thought, and engage parents and kids," said Tariq Zaid, owner of nearby Richmond Hood Company, one of the supporters of the project. He hopes that the wall will attract the attention of intermediate and high school teachers, who will bring their students to the site to ponder the artwork.

"Students need to spend time looking at it, thinking about it, talking about it, and writing about it," he said, all part of the underlying public-education message of the project. "If teachers are willing, we could even try to arrange discussion sessions between the artists and students," he added.

'IT'S ABOUT TIME'

Silver Lake resident Holly Delaney-Wade, mother of three, attended the ribbon-cutting and was pleased with what she saw, explaining first that she has known two of the artists -- Cody Prez and Mike Shane -- "since they were babies."

"There are no clean lines" marking where the work of one artist ends and another's begins, she observed as she stepped back to take in all the graphic images. This fluidity made sense to her "because pills hit all of our neighborhoods and demographics." "It's about time," she added appreciatively. "This is well-done, and I hope to see more of it."

NYC Arts Cypher has another PILLZ KILLZ message wall in the works at a location on the South Shore, Balducci said, although he was not ready to provide details.